10/16/2010 - Great White Icicle

[jman]

This is written on my iPhone so I apologize it's a short TR, but will make up for it tomorrow with pics and possibly some videos.

My friends and I headed to Great White Icicle yesterday and to our surprise, turned out to be a pretty good canyon. Although the ascent of 600 feet or so was exhausting (think of climbing up the exit of Pleaides 5x)!

We started out at 2pm (and ended at 6:30) and made up our way up the gully (as Shane puts it, "if it's miserable-then you are in the right place") which took about an hour and a half. We crossed the stream and headed toward the first waterfall. 50ft of a granite wall encased with very slippery moss which made it a bit tricky. The first rap had loads of webbing so we removed some and replaced the main one.

The stream was only ankle deep (but plenty of it) so wetsuits were definitely not needed.

Once we got to the second drop, it was quite a awkward start. A rappeller better walk over to the bokt station before reaching the bottom otherwise you gotta climb up a narrow and very slippery crack.

The rest of the rappels were very fun and grippy. It was a nice granite gorge for pictures!




Btw Shane, your beta says it's a 1600' ft ascent?!!! Where did u start counting that from? It should be revised so it's says 600'.

And the last rappel was not located on the big granite boulders. Someone removed them and instead put a 2bolt anchor on the right side of the lip of the falls, LDC. And the rappel definitely was not 50ft. We double stranded our 200 ft rope and it barely reached the bottom. It was almost a perfect length of a 100ft.

Other than those two, spot-on beta!

[Brian in SLC]

And the last rappel was not located on the big granite boulders. Someone removed them and instead put a 2bolt anchor on the right side of the lip of the falls, LDC. And the rappel definitely was not 50ft. We double stranded our 200 ft rope and it barely reached the bottom. It was almost a perfect length of a 100ft.!

Nah, the boulder the last anchor was in was blown of its perch by rock fall directly above (if you look straight up, just climber's left of the water course, you can see the jagged edge where the rock fall came down). If you look closely, at the base of the falls, in the large boulders near the bottom, you'll see the bolt holes in the boulder (which is resting in a pile of rubble at the base). Crazy. Happened some time in April of 2007.

Before and after shots:

http://www.mountainproject.com/v/brian_in_slc/106069482

If you look closely across the water course from the new anchor, you'll see a bolted anchor fairly high on the wall, sitting up in space. Was just above the boulder that had the anchor in it. Nutty.

Cheers,

-Brian in SLC